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Thursday, April 19, 2007
Defensible Space
The recent events at Virginia Tech have the effect of making me acutely aware of the number of windows and doors in the rooms in which I teach. Like 1 door, no windows. The proverbial "ducks in a barrel."
I posted before and took it out because I didn't want to seem insensitive to the victims of the tragedy but if one person were carrying a weapon, would the shooter have gotten as far as he did?
Thanks for reposting (it was kind of creepy not to know what had been said & by whom!). I've heard this kind of thing bantered about, but I guess for me the question is purely academic, since I would not have been the one carrying the weapon. I imagine myself as the teacher. Not a fun mental image. For that matter, if campus police were to carry weapons (do they?), presumably they could play an active role in containing the violence. Perhaps campus police everywhere need to be better trained to deal with crisis situations. And classrooms need to have 2 doors and windows whenever possible!!
Some colleges have campus police who carry weapons and some don't. (No idea which VT does.)
The training (and salary) for armed campus cops is _much_ higher than for your basic "security guy" and so often that's something which gets skimped on.
I'm generally very supportive of the "carry permits will help" approach to things -- but in general there are very few college age people who go through the training and carry. (The classes take a while, you have to be over 21, a good carry gun usually runs over $500, etc.) So except for the occasional instructor (and few college instructors I know would be interested) I'm not sure your chances would be good of having someone with a carry permit around for a campus shooting.
I'm just trying to picture the professors in my department toting guns. It's a humorous vision... What you might be asking for there is a Marxist revolution! ;) I suspect that those who do feminist theory would be the most likely to carry weapons, unless they'd be afraid the guns would be considered prosthetic *ahem* organs... In some departments, I could see it happening, especially in Texas. I'd probably feel secure if one or two of my did have guns, but I'd want to choose which ones...
5 comments:
I posted before and took it out because I didn't want to seem insensitive to the victims of the tragedy but if one person were carrying a weapon, would the shooter have gotten as far as he did?
Thanks for reposting (it was kind of creepy not to know what had been said & by whom!). I've heard this kind of thing bantered about, but I guess for me the question is purely academic, since I would not have been the one carrying the weapon. I imagine myself as the teacher. Not a fun mental image. For that matter, if campus police were to carry weapons (do they?), presumably they could play an active role in containing the violence. Perhaps campus police everywhere need to be better trained to deal with crisis situations. And classrooms need to have 2 doors and windows whenever possible!!
Some colleges have campus police who carry weapons and some don't. (No idea which VT does.)
The training (and salary) for armed campus cops is _much_ higher than for your basic "security guy" and so often that's something which gets skimped on.
I'm generally very supportive of the "carry permits will help" approach to things -- but in general there are very few college age people who go through the training and carry. (The classes take a while, you have to be over 21, a good carry gun usually runs over $500, etc.) So except for the occasional instructor (and few college instructors I know would be interested) I'm not sure your chances would be good of having someone with a carry permit around for a campus shooting.
I'm just trying to picture the professors in my department toting guns. It's a humorous vision... What you might be asking for there is a Marxist revolution! ;) I suspect that those who do feminist theory would be the most likely to carry weapons, unless they'd be afraid the guns would be considered prosthetic *ahem* organs... In some departments, I could see it happening, especially in Texas. I'd probably feel secure if one or two of my did have guns, but I'd want to choose which ones...
one or two of my students that is...
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